I think you've got potential here but it needs more depth. Some of the lines have a cynical dry twist on them that makes them funny and poignant at the same time. From that, I get a decent sense of the narrator but he never really strays far from the usual type of narrator in this kind of story. Whether he describes himself as a cutout or not, it would help the story a lot if his voice didn't feel so much like one. Otherwise it fades from memory too quickly and from the powerul ending, it's obvious you wanted to leave a strong impression. You've just gotta ramp things up and make it yours. You don't have to make the narrator likeable, just lifelike. You're halfway there, just don't be afraid to leave the stereotypes behind. :) One last thing: the conversation that sets this all off doesn't feel important enough, like it doesn't seem it could stick in his mind enough to influence his actions. It's a turning point for him so it should be played up more.

I wasn't crazy about this one because I felt you could have used the prompt a little more creatively. It felt cliche in many aspects and I didn't feel like I was reading something new. I didn't enjoy your capitalization of "Dave the Cool Artistic Kid" because I felt those attributes didn't need to be capitalized and would have worked better if you hadn't, actually. That's merely personal preference, however.

Overall, this piece is good, but I spent a great deal of time waiting for something to jump out at me, something unique. However, your writing was solid, so good work there. Best of luck in this month's WCC.

Hm...there were things about this that I felt were a little cliche. I didn't really like the way that the prompt was used because for me it was too obvious, I would have rather like to have seen the actual phrase of the prompt left out and used in a different way. And though the naming of kids in high school by what clique they fit into is fun, it's been done before, most famously by Speak, and I wasn't sure that it was exactly original here. I also was wondering why the names started not getting capitalized towards the end of the piece? Like "Col Artistic Kid" is capitalized by "angry kid" and "Theater kid" isn't? Anyway, though it ends quite dramatically, I wanted a more original take on the subject. It's sad, but I wanted it to capture me in a new way.

Wow is all I can say. That was emotionally gripping. It was so intense, and then all of a sudden it was over. Very different way of writing than what I usually read, but very good nonetheless. I liked the dramatic edge to it, and I am sure I will read more of your work in the future. Very good.